20 years ago today...

...TWA flight 800 exploded off Long Island.   There's a lot going on in our world today and this will pass without thought for the most part, but it's worth mentioning that some consider this a cold case that was never fully solved.

Here's one of them--former NTSB investigator Hank Hughes, explaining his role and opinion.  For what it's worth, the damage pattern seen on MH17, a verifiable missile shoot-down, didn't resemble what can be seen on the reconstructed TWA 747.  But, we don't know what the wings or horizontal stabilizers looked like or the tail fin as they were not included in the rebuild.  Nor were the engines. 

And we still don't know why agencies like the CIA were involved in explaining to the public the NTSB's implausible scenario that the nose fell off and the rest of the aircraft ascended several thousand feet, which was meant to explain away eyewitnesses who said they saw missile streaks.

Meanwhile, few if any aircraft have been retrofitted for nitrogen inerting systems, which were supposed to prevent future similar crashes, of which there have been none.  And cargo aircraft were not included in this recommended fix because we all know cargo aircraft don't blow up or something.  So you decide.   

Regardless, the official probable cause is in the books and will not be changed anytime soon. Eventually the skeptics and cynics and conspiracists will die off and the story of flight 800 will be relegated to the corners of history.  But there's someone running for president right now who might know a little more than the average Joe.

The guy is a terrorist--go grab his ass

Those words were once spoken by noted climate scientist and vice president Al Gore.  He offered the blunt assessment to Bill Clinton and his advisors huddling over how to handle a foreign terrorist.  In doing so he admitted it was a violation of international law.  But the guy's a terrorist!   

Strange how after the biggest terrorist attack in American history we actually DID go grab a terrorist's ass, in Italy.   But the CIA officers who did it were all later convicted of crimes by outraged Italian prosecutors.  One of the officers, Sabrina de Souza,  has found herself in a position of being extradited back to Rome to perhaps face serving jail time.  She made the mistake of leaving the States. 

And the Obama administration seems OK with that.  

Without knowing all the intricate details of this case, on the surface it sure seems weird that we would trade 5 hardcore Taliban terrorist commanders for an Army deserter, then allow the Italians to roast a CIA officer who herself was also on the global battlefield defending the West against radical Islamists like this cretin.   But it's an outrage a day anymore.  

Pipe Dreams and other things

Donald Trump recently said it-- Bush lied!   And that's odd, since his likely opponent Hillary Clinton has never out and out called Bush a liar on Iraq.  With that in mind, Instapundit links a slick video featuring Judith Miller explaining why Bush didn't lie about Iraq...


It's sad such a video has to be made because it was obvious to any informed person that Bush didn't lie.  Grossly misunderestimate the Butcher?  Panic a little after 9/11?  Worry about being blamed for follow on attacks traced to Iraqi material or know-how?  Yes, yes and yes. 

But in a world where people will willingly raise their right hands and swear allegiance to Donald Trump or vote for an outright socialist who thinks everything should basically be free, people will believe anything

Of course the Miller video will never be believed by those who believe Bush lied, but some of us will never stop trying to speak truth to power. 

So here's a flashback to current Vice President Joe Biden discussing Iraq and the lie meme with the late Tim Russert back in 2007, with added emphasis:

MR. RUSSERT: Where are they?

SEN. BIDEN: Well, the point is, it turned out they didn’t, but everyone in the world thought he had them. The weapons inspectors said he had them. He catalogued—they catalogued them. This was not some, some Cheney, you know, pipe dream. This was, in fact, catalogued. They looked at them and catalogued. What he did with them, who knows? The real mystery is, if he, if he didn’t have any of them left, why didn’t he say so? Well, a lot of people say if he had said that, he would’ve, you know, emboldened Iran and so on and so forth.

This was the same Joe Biden who said Iraq would be a wonderful victory for America when Obama pulled everyone out in 2011. Joe knows some things about Saddam. So does Hillary. She knows what her husband knows. Neither have ever claimed Bush lied.  They just let that sleeping dog lie because they know it's the gift that keeps giving.  But they dare not go very far down the path. 

Mrs Clinton's adviser John Podesta recently said he wants reporters to ask her about UFOs. He says people can 'handle the truth'. Well maybe, unless it's this truth.  But people can handle all kinds of truths.  Get some knowledgeable people to ask her about Saddam. If they catch her unprepared with the right questions it might change the election.

Meaning of the word 'is' again

History repeats.  That's basically what the Clintons are doing on this email scandal, same playbook as Monica.   Define an issue down to legal terms, use legal parsing to craft disingenuous replies, then look in the camera with the best serious face and blame a vast right wing conspiracy.

Can't blame them, it worked before, largely with the same breed of media.  Even tonight one of Clinton's main flacks was on Megyn Kelly's show defending the indefensible, and with vigor and gusto. It's all they've got.  But with a helpful (or even lackadaisical) media not riling up the muddy middle swing voters with saturation coverage, it's not beyond succeeding. 

Meanwhile, getting to wherever we're going on this is already an exercise in the bizarre.  Hillary likes to say she never 'sent or received email that was classified at the time'.  She also likes to say that no organization is too big to fail and no person is too big to jail.  She even said some of this wearing black and white striped pants suits.  Does she even get the irony there?   Or is she just rubbing it in?
 
She is the smartest woman in the world, after all.

Back in reality where chief gumshoe James Comey works (he of Ashcroft hospital drama fame) the stakes are high.  Comey has a legacy as a straight shooter and lefty hero for challenging the evil, constitution crapping imperial president Bushco, but he's got some new cards to play now. Will he play them fairly?  If he recommends indictment and Lynch blows it off, will he resign out of protest?  Or will he see the lucrative FBI position, stretching well into the next president's tenure, as something to protect and serve?  Cough, "I did all I could", sigh, let's move on to ISIS.  No protest leaves the media wide open to carry Hillary's water all the way to the next set of Roman columns. 

My guess is Comey won't fizzle out on principle and we may see something sooner than later.  The more the FBI drags this out the more primary wins Hillary can accumulate, then claim that any FBI investigation is purely partisan and interfering with a national election. There would be some precedence in that, too.  So maybe we'll see something this weekend. 

MORE  1/31/16

The something we saw this weekend was nothing.  So, it appears the FBI is going to let the voters caucus on Monday and beyond before taking any action.  

So here's more wild speculation.  After she's won a primary or three, if FBI moves to indict her the campaign will throw up a flag and cry foul, claiming the FBI is trying to impede an election.   When the right reacts as they predictably will (loud and boisterous) the Clinton machine will attack them as making a phony scandal out of an honest 'mistake'.   That's probably where the press will kick into top gear on the story, jumping in with the historic Mrs Rodham Clinton's campaign, helping her douse the fire before moving the rubes on to other preferred narratives, like the war on women.  It would help is some big breaking story came along to feed that, but surely one can be arranged.

Meanwhile the GOP will wither under the attacks and demand people 'move on' to the substantive issues facing the country, etc etc.

The only wildcard in that scenario is Trump.      

A Strange Eulogy

Sandy Berger, the former National Security Advisor to Bill Clinton, has passed away. He died of cancer at 70 on Wednesday, ironically the same day America was attacked again by Islamic terrorists. Ironic, because he will be remembered more for his role in terrorism than anything else he accomplished in his career.

Here's a eulogy of sorts by the Politico, which contains some rather strange comments. First, from the current president:

"From his service in President Carter's State Department to President Clinton's National Security Advisor, Sandy devoted himself to strengthening American leadership in an uncertain world," Obama said. "Today, his legacy can be seen in a peaceful Balkans, our strong alliance with Japan, our deeper relationships with India and China."

First, was our relationship with Japan broken before Clinton came in? Second, you'll notice there's no mention of his legacy regarding Islamic terrorism (well, mainly because to the White House, it doesn't exist).  Here's how his former bosses remembered their old co-worker:

"Nobody was more knowledgeable about policy or smarter about how to formulate it," Bill and Hillary Clinton said in a statement Wednesday. "He was great both in analyzing a situation and figuring out what to do about it. His gifts proved invaluable time and time again, in Latin America, the Balkans, Northern Ireland and the Middle East."

The "Middle East"? Hmm, what did Berger do to improve it leading up to 9/11? But he was apparently an important outside advisor to Hillary2016!

As secretary of state, Clinton consulted Berger on topics from how to handle Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to how to "gain leverage over the Pakistanis" and persuade them to go after al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden, her emails show.

Wonder what he thought of the private server debacle, considering the fact he was once described as "sloppy" with regards to national security?  Or maybe that was the advice.  Anyway, he persuaded the Pakistanis to go after bin Laden? That didn't really work out too well, unless somebody just slipped something out (some believe they were involved).  But of course the Politico saved the most prolific part of Berger's legacy for last:

Berger's legacy was marred, however, when he pleaded guilty in 2005 to removing highly classified documents from the National Archives in Washington the previous year. The inspector general of the National Archives said that a staff member had witnessed the former NSA adviser wrapping the classified documents around his socks and under his pants.

And have we ever discovered exactly what he removed and/or destroyed from that esteemed repository, or why? Media at the time speculated it had to do only with the Millennium bombing plot (LAX) after-action reports he had access to, but that never made sense because it was a victory of sorts for Clinton.  Remember, he was prepping for interviews from the 9/11 Commission. 

Others were more conspiratorial, figuring it had something to do with TWA 800. Others theorized it had to do with the hunt, or lack thereof, for bin Laden before 9/11.   Remember how apoplectic Clinton got when anyone suggested he didn't go hard after weird beard? 

Or maybe it was to do with the attacks on Khartoum in 1998 following the AQ attack on the African embassies--Berger made the case Saddam Hussein was helping bin Laden cook up VX nerve gas. After a pharmaceutical plant specializing in manufacturing aspirin was bombed in response to his guidance--and no links were found-- Berger apologized. Wait, no, he never apologized or came down off that advice, at least publicly.  After the Bush invasion of Iraq it was odd the media never went back and revisited that mission, since the Clintons were basically bombing a country due to a link between Saddan and AQ.  Ok, just kidding there, it's not at all strange they wanted nothing to do with that history.  After all, they were involved.  

Actually it was all just another example of the vast right wing conspiracy.   Media Matters explained it all back in 2005, nothing to see move along wing nuts.

I always wondered about the risk/reward of stealing the docs and never completely bought the bumbler Oscar Madison meme, none of which seem supported by the linked accolades.  So, what would prompt such a risk? If it was protecting national security at large somebody else could have done it.  Makes more sense for it to have been more of a personal mission. With Hillary representing the future of the Clinton political machine at the time it made more sense as an attempt to get something very incriminating and legacy toppling out of the way before the 9/11 Commission, or politicians thereon, found it.  That he wasn't locked away by a Republican administration also begged a lot--a lot--of questions.

Unfortunately for the sake of transparency and the American public's right to know, he has taken some of that information to the grave. Based on all the good he did for the poor and hungry around the world let's hope it was one of those "you can't handle the truth" things rather than merely a secret mission from team Little Rock.   We probably stand more of a chance of seeing the Khalidi going away party video than we do ever getting closure here. 

Classified Relativism

The NY Times has an interesting feature today on former diplomat Robin Raphel, charged last year with delivering classified information to Pakistan.  Why interesting?  Because, as the story notes, the case against Raphel has "fizzled".  Hmm, as the bloggers say.

The Times goes on to mention numerous figures on the right and left who've been involved in mishandling classified information--yes, even Hillary.  For some reason they forgot to mention "Obama's favorite general" Hoss Cartwright, a person of interest in leaking Stuxnet intelligence on Iran to the media.  At last check that had fizzled due to complexities with the Iran nuke deal or something. 

That aside, it's been well-reported that the Obama administration has prosecuted more leakers than all other administrations combined, mostly lower level folks.  The Times article notes that current FBI Director James Comey was a little upset with the Justice Department's deal with General Petraueus as they feared it might set precedence for future cases--indeed that's exactly what Raphel's defense team seems to be doing.  But who cares about Raphel, right?  How does this relate to anything else?     

The cynic might say this points in one direction--the Clinton server in Chappaqua.  The cynic might also say the left needs a way to dumb-down the severity of mishandling classified information with their leading 2016 hopeful in the situation she's in.  So, have the media point to the relativism of past prosecutions and make everything muddy with hopes the peeps can get past such peccadillos worthy of putting lesser luminaries in Leavenworth.  Is that what's going on here?   

By the way, in a previous mention here of Ms Raphel there was a link to this 1996 LA Times story.  It's truly one of those "must-reads" from the past that shines light on how messed up things got later.  A snip, emphasis added:

And a Taliban official, Shirmohammed Stanekzai, gave public assurances this week that under the Islamic militia's rule, this country will no longer serve as a training ground or haven for foreign extremists. "As the Islamic movement of Taliban, we don't want to interfere in others' affairs," Stanekzai said. "We don't want to send people to create problems in other countries."

If foreign terrorists fall into the Taliban's hands, he said, "we will punish them hard."

Such words--uttered at a news conference for the foreign media, which have flocked to Kabul since the Taliban captured this capital last Friday--will be sweet music for officials in Washington. Combating terrorism and the global trade in narcotics are leading items on the U.S. foreign policy agenda.

The current conspiracy theories are understandable, even plausible, given the great mystery that still shrouds the Taliban's rise and rapid advance. How did a ragtag force that emerged in late 1994 among Muslim religious students in the southern region of Kandahar and adjacent areas of Pakistan grow so quickly that two years later, it has become master of three-quarters of Afghanistan?

Who paid for its weaponry, ammunition and vehicles? Who organized its training and logistics? Is intelligence or military assistance received from outside one of the reasons the Taliban has enjoyed astonishing, and relatively bloodless, successes over experienced moujahedeen commanders who, for nearly a decade, fought occupying Soviet troops?

Generous support for the Taliban from Pakistan, which wants to pacify its war-racked neighbor for its own strategic and economic motives, has been well documented. But is Pakistan's powerful ally, the United States, also involved in some way? Many in Kabul believe so, though again, their proof is circumstantial.

Notice the LAT refers to it as a conspiracy theory, but who remembers hearing that the Clinton administration propped up the Taliban back before 9/11?  Surely Ms Raphel has a memory of it.  Maybe she has a book in her?   And maybe Robert Redford can do another "truth" movie about this whole thing... maybe get Valerie Plame to star as Ms Raphel.  If they get to work soon they can have it out right after Hillary gets the nomination.  

22 Years Ago Today...

...the War on Terror, as we know it, began. Few realized it at the time, especially when the Waco standoff started only days later and stretched out for 2 months. Several years later a Kuwaiti-born Muslim, Abdul Basit Karim, aka Ramzi Yousef, was convicted of the crime and sent to the federal Supermax prison in Colorado for life, to be forgotten. He had acquired his bomb-making skills via higher education in Britain.


So what do we really know about that attack? Here's a summary at the time...

 

It's amazing that 1) the FBI knew of the bombing plot but pulled out their agent, 2) afterwards a mysterious master bomb-maker shows up along with an Iraqi and the plot gets pushed to a new level, as if they'd been tipped. There was no 2/26 Commission, mainly because Bill Clinton was president. There wasn't a full investigation of the 1993 attack by the 9/11 Commission, mainly because Bill Clinton still had dreams of returning to the White House for a third term via his wife. Without extreme public scrutiny and/or the retirement of the Clintons, the truth will not be coming out.

Meanwhile, two decades later another Kuwaiti-born Muslim, also schooled in Britain, is suspected of being the guy waving the knife at the West in videos before cutting the head off another helpless victim as he represents a Jihadist organization Ramzi Yousef could only dream of.   Pretending he only needed a job or that Bush lied or that the Crusades prompted him to sharpen his knife is just a pitiful reminder of where we stand in this fight. 

WMDs in Iraq again

What the heck is the NY Times doing?  This is the second major story they've printed in the past six months about WMDs being found in Iraq..

The extraordinary arms purchase plan, known as Operation Avarice, began in 2005 and continued into 2006, and the American military deemed it a nonproliferation success. It led to the United States’ acquiring and destroying at least 400 Borak rockets, one of the internationally condemned chemical weapons that Saddam Hussein’s Baathist government manufactured in the 1980s but that were not accounted for by United Nations inspections mandated after the 1991 Persian Gulf war.

Now let's be clear, nobody is saying these were the stockpiles of WMDs Bush and most of the western powers were using as a casus belli for war.  At the same time, the conventional wisdom hasn't changed since 2008 and it states that Sarah Palin can see Russia from her house and there were no WMDs found in Iraq. None, nada, zilch.  Then along comes the Times...

The analysis of sarin samples from 2005 found that the purity level reached 13 percent — higher than expected given the relatively low quality and instability of Iraq’s sarin production in the 1980s, officials said. Samples from Boraks recovered in 2004 had contained concentrations no higher than 4 percent.

The new data became grounds for concern. “Borak rockets will be more hazardous than previously assessed,” one internal report noted. It added a warning: the use of a Borak in an improvised bomb “could effectively disperse the sarin nerve agent.”

Of course none of which Saddam declared to Hans Blix before the invasion.

So two questions. One, with ex-Ba'athist regime thugs reportedly working with ISIS on military strategies what are the chances they've stashed some of this material away for later use, perhaps even privately threatening to use it here or there if we do this or that?  That could explain the presidential foot-dragging, assuming one were inclined to believe Obama has a desire not to foot drag.

Two, how will this go over politically? The Washington Post is already asking how Jeb Bush will handle his brother's failure to find WMDs in Iraq, but that would also bring in Hillary's yes vote in 2002. Many experts believe Hillary lost to Obama in 2008 because of her Iraq vote. Would she dare come out and blame her vote on Jeb's brother, especially with some WMDs found in Iraq and stuff like this still on the internet?



Maybe a revelation about some WMDs being found in Iraq helps.  She's a hawk figure and a lawyer, she could craftily say Duyba and Cheney still misled her but she also knew there was some danger there, therefore she and the First Man are the only candidates able to fix it, etc.  Might work.  Why else would the Times pursue this?

Another Ali

One might think that understanding a terror group like al Qaeda would require some historical background.  Yet most seemed satisfied with the abbreviated picture provided by the 9/11 Commission Report, never wondering much about how the two WTC attacks tied together.  After all, there was that August 2001 PDB thing that Bush ignored.

But the history remains, waiting to be uncovered.  For instance, there was that whole thing with Ali Mohammad, an Egyptian double crosser, a story few have ever heard.  And Emad Salem, the Egyptian mole planted in the Brooklyn cell by the FBI but pulled before the group set off a bomb in the WTC on February 26, 1993.  Weird, wild, stuff, to the curious at least.  Not so much for the media, but perhaps they were distracted by the Waco standoff that began only days after the first WTC attack.

But the passage of time is producing more history.   About a year ago it was revealed that the FBI's Los Angeles office might have had a mole in contact with bin Laden way back in the early 90s:

On Wednesday, though, U.S. law enforcement sources were looking into a report in the The Washington Times and then elsewhere that the FBI had actively placed the source in direct contact with bin Laden and hid that fact from both the 9/11 Commission and congressional investigators. In fact, testimony in the lawsuit indicates the source had already met with bin Laden by the time an FBI agent recruited him.

In January 1993, a month before the first World Trade Center bombing, FBI agent Bassem Youssef began recruiting two sources from Los Angeles with strong ties to Omar Abdel Rahman, the so-called “Blind Sheikh” who masterminded that first attack on New York City, Youssef testified nearly four years ago in his discrimination case against the FBI. Within two years, one of the sources was handing over “highly sensitive information on the entire network in the U.S. as well as abroad,” Youssef told a federal jury in Washington on Sept. 15, 2010.

None of this was in the commission report because the FBI deemed it irrelevant. Today, another revelation emerged:

An American citizen who underwent al Qaeda training only to later quit the extremist group revealed he was asked to carry out a mid-air assassination against Hosni Mubarak back in 1995. Ihab Mohammad Ali, testifying against alleged al Qaeda leader Khaled al-Fawwaz, says he was asked by Osama bin Laden to use his private plane to ram a plane carrying the Egyptian president.

'It took me by surprise,' said 52-year old Ali while testifying in New York federal court. 'I responded, "Well, wouldn't I be killing myself?"'

Weird.  So there was an unknown mole named Youseff and a terrorist named Yousef, and now an unknown mole named Mohammad Ali and a triple agent named Ali Mohammad.  Scant few Google stories on Ihab Mohammad Ali, odd considering his aviation and terrorist background:

Ali, who had also instructed members of Egyptian Islamic Jihad, a group that was later absorbed into al Qaeda, on reading flight maps and interpreting air traffic control radio transmissions. The group claimed responsibility for various bombings and attacks throughout the 1990s while it was fighting the Mubarak regime.

That would be the same EIJ who sent some leaders to Baghdad for a meeting before the US invaded in 2003.  The same EIJ who sent anthrax scare letters to Canadian authorities before 9/11 and before the US anthrax letter attacks.

So with all the talk since 9/11 of planes being used as weapons here's a pilot named Mohammad Ali, an EIJ terrorist who hobnobbed with bin Laden and taught jihadists about aviation and interpreting ATC lingo (which could come in handy in a 9/11 type attack) and the public has never been told until now.

It's a big story, after all, a plot to crash his aircraft into Hosni Mubarek's jet in 1995, performing a suicide attack at altitude (gotta love Ali's alleged response). Sounds kind of far-fetched, but then again so did Jack Cashill and James Sanders' scenario in their book "First Strike" about the demise of TWA 800 back in 1996.  If Ali is correct, the terrorists were actually discussing the Cashill/Sanders theory a year before 800.  Not fit to print, though.

At any rate, if this slow-walking history from the 90s seems strange it's really not.  Perhaps one day the true path to 9/11 will become clear but one thing seems clear already--especially with certain political figures from the 90s still vying for ultimate power--it's going to remain slow for awhile.

Perusing the latest Clinton Library Docs

It's Friday before the Columbus Day weekend, so what better time than to release more required documents from the Clinton Library?!   A lot of stuff, but here are some snippets from the section on "African Embassy Bombings":

later in the same doc..

Notice what the White House was crossing out in this talking point outline--any mention of AQ and the likelihood they would attack again.  Their first draft, just like the first guess on Benghazi, seemed correct.  Then politics appears to have taken over. 

The WaPo took interest in an exchange of a Clinton staffer dissing Jimmy Carter for penning an negative op-ed on the retaliatory bombing of the al-Shifa pharmaceutical plant in Khartoum, Sudan in 1998, thought by the administration to have been a plant producing VX nerve gas for bin Laden (with help from Iraqi scientists).   But check out this verbiage...

Ah, the 'full information'.  At some point during the late 90s everyone pretty much agreed the al-Shifa bombing was a big mistake, ie, "Clinton bombed an aspirin factory and killed the night watchman based on false information" to 'wag the dog'.  Everybody, that is, but Sandy Berger and Dan Benjamin, who had recommended it and who've never come off their decision.

And from the looks of this memo there were others in the administration who appeared to know more than was being publicly stated, to the point that if Jimmy Carter knew everything he wouldn't have written the op-ed.  So, what was that information?  And why has the mainstream media never tried to pry it out of these guys? 

Nothing but the Truth

Weird, this..

The day before the terror attacks on September 11, 2001, former President Bill Clinton told a group of businessmen in Australia that he "could have killed" the man behind those attacks, Osama bin Laden, in 1998, but he decided against launching a strike out of concern for civilian casualties.

Hmm, the premise has long been known to those who pay attention thanks to CIA people like Michael Scheuer and Hank Crumpton.  What's new is widespread media this will get compared to the two figures listed above. 

It's only a coicidence Bubba was blubbering about this on the day before the attack. He cannot be completely blamed--he did what he did.  Had 'he' killed UBL it's almost certain KSM would have carried on his nephew Ramzi's plot, although it might have taken longer.   They are relentless in their violent pursuits, as everyone knows. 

The weirder thing is why it was released now.   The liberal businessman who hired Clinton to speak and released this tape claims he 'forgot' about it, which is something even a child wouldn't believe. Perhaps it has something to do with getting some dirty laundry out in the press before Billary declares their 2016 candidacy.   Or maybe the Aussie guy has become a conservative.  It's the kind of tape that could have come out in 2008 had Hillary been the nominee, opposition research being what it is. 

Meanwhile, this story returned only yesterday:

A U.S. congressman calling for the release of classified material from a report into 9/11 has warned there would be 'anger, frustration, and embarrassment' if the redacted pages were made public.

It came out back in December then died. It's coming out again, right before the Senate releases their double secret CIA torture report designed to bash Bush and the GOP in general.   Feel free to speculate on what might be 'embarrassing' about these redacted pages telling the story on 9/11--I have my own suspicions, but they may be wrong.  However, perhaps political pressure of this nature alongside an administration who still claims they are the most transparent ever (as they release a document on 'torture') will force a chance for the whole truth to come out one day.  Keep hope alive. 

Clinton to Berger on bin Laden

Gotta watch the stuff trickling out of the Bubba R Clinton Presidential Library in Little Rock.  On a Friday doc dump the library released a handwritten note from the first black president to Sandy 'socks' Berger, his national security advisor at the time, expressing doubt about some intelligence on bin Laden.

The note was written several months after Clinton bombed some tents in Khost Afghanistan and an aspirin factory in the Sudan (1998), which prompted charges he was 'wagging the dog' to remove attention from Monicagate. 

For those who've forgotten, Clinton bombed the plant based on CIA evidence of traces of EMPTA in the ground outside the plant, a substance related to the processing of VX nerve gas.  What most of the mainstream press reports are conveniently ignoring is that the Clinton crew thought Saddam's WMD scientists were involved in helping bin Laden produce this chemical.

So here's the note:

What does it suggest?  And why were they unafraid to release it?  At the same time, they were afraid to release any part of the internal communications between Berger and colleagues Dan Benjamin and Richard Clarke in response--national security.

Well, since Clinton was referencing a NY Times article in 1999 it's useful to understand what Times writer Tim Weiner was saying:

The interviews also raise questions about key assertions that have been made by the Government about Mr. bin Laden. Senior intelligence officials concede that their knowledge of him is sketchy. ''We can't say for sure what was going on'' with him from 1991 to 1996 -- most of the years covered in the indictment -- one senior official said.

His Affluence Seems Overstated Present and former American officials and former business associates of Mr. bin Laden say he appears to control only a fraction of the $250 million fortune that the American Government says he possesses. ''Clearly, his money's running out,'' said Frank Anderson, a former senior Central Intelligence Agency official who maintains close Middle Eastern contacts.

Larry Johnson, the State Department deputy counterterrorism director from 1988 to 1993, said Administration officials had ''tended to make Osama bin Laden sort of a Superman in Muslim garb -- he's 10 feet tall, he's everywhere, he knows everything, he's got lots of money and he can't be challenged.''

Milton Bearden, a retired senior C.I.A. official who ran the agency's war in Afghanistan and retired in 1995, said the Government had ''created a North Star'' in Mr. bin Laden. ''He is public enemy No. 1,'' Mr. Bearden said. ''We've got a $5 million reward out for his head. And now we have, with I'm not sure what evidence, linked him to all of the terrorist acts of this year -- of this decade, perhaps.''

In other words, anonymous CIA and Justice people were telling the Times the legal case against UBL wasn't solid while former high profile intelligence people were downplaying his role.  At the same time Vince Cannistraro, another former intel guy, was telling ABC News that bin Laden might be teaming up with Saddam, while also allegedly telling lawyer Stephen Jones of Oklahoma City bombing fame that the government didn't want any foreign suspects in that case.  Richard Clarke, who was part of the communication with Berger on this event, once famously said UBL might 'boogie to Baghdad' if they missed getting him in Afghanistan.  No wonder Slick was confused.

The key phrase is obviously, "..the CIA sure overstated its case to me..".  So what 'case' does he suspect was being overstated?  This was after a PDB in December 1998 warning of al Qaeda hijacking an airplane to secure the release of members of the 1993 WTC attack and after the embassy attacks, so it's not like terrorism itself was being overstated, just the role of the players involved.

Reporters are assuming he meant CIA was overstating the importance of bin Laden but it's valid to wonder whether Clinton might have been asking a broader question--if UBL is not the 'north star' the CIA claims, who is?   It's hard to imagine how one New York Times article could prompt doubt about terrorism in general, Clinton seemed to be confused on the role of one guy in the nexus--bin Laden.

And that goes directly to the response, which was completely redacted. Keep in mind Clarke and Benjamin have never come off the intelligence that led them to recommend bombing al-Shifa and few if any in the press have grilled them about it.  Returning to Tom Joscelyn's link above..

"The consistent stream of intelligence at that time said it wasn't just al-Shifa. There were three different structures in the Sudan. There was the hiring of Iraqis. There was no question that the Iraqis were there. Some of the Clinton people seem to forget that they did make the Iraqi connection."

So Clinton was questioning the CIA's assessment of UBL, at least in private, while his own team was indicting UBL and making links between him and Saddam Hussein.  As late as 1999. 

Yet when Clinton gave Fox an interview in 2006 (where he wagged his finger at Chris Matthews), he seemed to be saying he did more than anyone to stop bin Laden:

CLINTON: All I'm saying is, you falsely accused me of giving aid and comfort to bin Laden because of what happened in Somalia. No one knew Al Qaeda existed then. And ...

WALLACE: But did they know in 1996 when he declared war on the U.S.? Did they know in 1998 ...

CLINTON: Absolutely, they did.

WALLACE: ... when he bombed the two embassies?

CLINTON: And who talked about ...

WALLACE: Did they know in 2000 when he hit the Cole?

CLINTON: What did I do? What did I do? I worked hard to try to kill him. I authorized a finding for the CIA to kill him. We contracted with people to kill him. I got closer to killing him than anybody has gotten since. And if I were still president, we'd have more than 20,000 troops there trying to kill him.

Now, I've never criticized President Bush, and I don't think this is useful. But you know we do have a government that thinks Afghanistan is only one-seventh as important as Iraq.

Pretty feisty, but he admits his counterterrorism team knew about the threat from bin Laden in 1996, three years prior to the note.  Evidently he was still wavering in 1999.

But in the same interview he also told Wallace that neither the CIA nor FBI would 'cerfify' that UBL was behind the attacks, which supports the wishy-washy narrative and provides him some cover despite the CIA setting up a special office in 1996 to track UBL headed by Michael Scheuer (who has been very critical of the Clinton team on apprehending or killing bin Laden in the late 90s).  

It also ignores the aforementioned indictment of UBL in 1998 (mentioning a tie to Iraq then updated to remove ties) and KSM.  Yet here's Slick still questioning the CIA's assessment of UBL's role in global terror in 1999.  Strange.

Could it impact Hillary! 2016?  Only if anyone asks.  Clintonistas might reply that it shows Bill was solidly focused on terrorism but wasn't sure about the intelligence on UBL due to some wishy-washyness at the CIA. Here's a comedic example of how an international news site handled it:

In one file referencing bin Laden, Clinton urgently asked his top national security aide whether the CIA overstated the involvement of the terrorist leader in the August 1998 bombings of U.S. embassies in Kenya and Tanzania.

Yes that's it, an 'urgent' Clinton was seeking 'extra' information in his quest for the terror leader. By the way, the indictment was in 1998 as indicated above in this post, not after April 1999 as in the story.  Now here's a biased domestic site:

...

Wait, there's very little coverage in the mainstream press other than a stock AP story.   Which by the way is the one quoted above in the international news site.  The Washington Post ran that stock AP story.  The New York Times, itself mentioned in the release, ran an in-house version of the story that said less than AP.  Did the AP intentionally report the indictment as after the note?   Moving it makes it appear Slick was more engaged or even indicted UBL based on the redacted reply from Berger.  Reality makes him look confused and less engaged.  Josh Gerstein explains as well.   

Aides, if anyone asks, may also argue the note explains his cruise missile flop in 1998, ie, it wasn't wagging the dog, it was the CIA overstating the case--or in other words, he was wondering if he was on the right target or whether someone else was running the terror show.   Those goofballs at CIA!   They could then claim that the response from Berger to Clinton, which nobody in public is allowed to see but they know, but can only summarize in general, was that no, the CIA did not overstate the status of UBL, he was still the top dog.  And Clinton, with his question answered, strapped on his cape and pressed forward in his relentless war against bin Laden, unlike Bush who "ignored" his own August 2001 PDB (heavily covered by the press for some reason) that led to 9/11.  They always have a ready answer that satisfies the baby bird press.

Perhaps more interesting than all the finger pointing and blame shifting is the reminder in the 1999 Times story of anniversaries.  The African embassy bombings of 1998 occurred exactly 8 years to the day after US forces entered Saudi Arabia to begin Operation Desert Shield to protect that country from Saddam's forces in Kuwait.  Add to that, in February 1993 the World Trade Center was bombed on the anniversary of the day celebrated in Kuwait as 'liberation day' (2/26/91) from Saddam's forces, and September 11, 1990 was the day when president George HW Bush first called for a "New World Order" in a speech declaring that Saddam's invasion of Kuwait would not stand.  Even this past week the shoot-down of MH17 occurred on the 18th anniversary of TWA800, although the CIA said there was "not a missile" involved in that one. Terrorists do love their anniversaries.   And yes, this post is too long. Nobody cares anymore. 

Clinton versus Cheney

Here's Bill Clinton on the developments in Iraq and the recent comments of Dick Cheney on the matter...


Cheney responded by reminding about Clinton's past comments...


So what did Slick actually say?  From 1998....



Specifically, here's what he said we learned in the 20th Century...

..we learned through harsh experience that the only answer to aggression and illegal behavior is firmness, determination, and when necessary, action.

..and on what we must know for the 21st Century:

..in the next century the community of nations may see more and more of the very kind of threat that Iraq poses now; a rogue state with weapons of mass destruction, ready to use them or provide them to terrorists, drug trafficers or organized criminals, who travel the world among us, unnoticed.

If we fail to respond today Saddam and all those who follow in his footsteps will be emboldened tomorrow by the knowledge they can act with impunity, even in the face of a clear message from the United Nations Security Council and the clear evidence of a weapons of mass destruction program...

Sounded a little like Cheney, eh?  In a nutshell those comments were predictive of what might happen with a weak lead-from-behind president like the one we have now.  We all see the results. 

But yeah, in the political arena (and certainly the Kardashian arena) Cheney's viewpoint will not prevail, even if he's right.  Bill Clinton is the last person who should be lecturing anyone about acting on Iraq. Good Lord, will anyone in the media develop a memory? Do bloggers have to do everything for them?  

MORE 6/27/14

Is the Hillary!2016 strategy coming into view? She has three glaring problems to put away before sailing to victory.

One, her (and her husband's) Iraq stance. Bill was relatively silent about Bush going into Iraq in 2003. He largely pulled a Bush43 by remaining silent on the sidelines while his wife was out warning about the menace of Saddam and voted affirmatively on the use of force. Hillary's hawkish stance falls perfectly in line with her husband's speeches, such as the one presented in this post. In 2008 she remained largely silent on the Iraq question, never apologizing, while Obama racked up points with his 'dumb war' rhetoric. The problem now is how to distance her from that history. A lot depends on what Iraq becomes over the next few years and who her opponent might be.

A matchup with Jeb Bush would bring a lot of that history into play, except Jeb will not want to play it. Knowing the Bush's they will not politicize 43's decisions or get into a pissing match about them. That of course would be fine for Hillary, who'd rather talk about domestic issues and other foreign policy actions. However, if Hillary comes up against someone like Rand Paul she'll face the same pressure given her by Obama. Hillary has reportedly already apologized for her vote in the new book nobody is buying, so the strategy may be to get this out in the open and put away now so she can move on to 2016. But it's doubtful a Rand Paul would let her forget it. So under that scenario she'll probably go full tilt lie and start trashing Bush about the intelligence and so forth, which Paul won't necessarily want to defend.

The second thing is Benghazi. We're already seeing the strategy here--blame Obama.

The third item is her competency as Secretary of State, which can also be answered by number two.

There are other issues, but one thing she'll have going for her is the economy, IF it remains in malaise. She will argue that she'll take on the policies of her husband, including his ability to negotiate with the Newt Gingriches of the GOP. She's already hawkish enough to give the impression she'll not hesitate to kick-ass on terrorists.

What's Not in the Clinton Document Dumps

Another round of documents oozed out of the Clinton Library last night, openly admitted as a 'document dump' by the WaPo.  Thing is, there's not much there there.

Most of the stuff that has emerged so far in the several dumps has been in the nothingburger category, or even positive for the Clintons.  Yeah, it's interesting to hear Clinton staffers worried and mused about how the press might see this or that, and granted, this was funny:

Among a long list of interview ideas, Caputo suggested Clinton do a "television magazine" show and offered Maria Shriver as interviewer. She said the segment should show Clinton "doing it all" - working on health care, picking out flowers for state dinner and include b-roll of "you attending one of Chelsea's soccer games or making a run to the local supermarket."

Who wouldn't want to see Hillary going to Wal Mart to pick up some generic cereal and a pair of mom jeans for Bill?  And why Arnold's wife would have been considered a go-to friendly source who would have accommodated such a ruse is left to conspiracy theorists.  But this is all known--every administration tries to finagle the press and public for image.  Sometimes the press obliges, sometimes they don't.  Usually based on R and D.

But what hasn't been seen, or reported on at least, are any bombshell documents/emails pertaining to the biggest story that emerged from the 90s--growing Islamic terrorism.  For a president who claimed to have 'done more than anyone' to kill bin Laden and destroy AQ there seems to be a dearth of emails being released on the subject.  Nothing also on staffer thoughts about Saddam Hussein, who was bombed regularly, or TWA800, which Clinton told historian Taylor Branch some months later that it could have been done by Iran because 'they want war'.

Will there be any emails released about how the coverage of the 1993 WTC bombing might have been affected by the ATF's raid on the Branch Davidian compound one day later and how that might have taken media coverage (and a spotlight on Clinton's response to finding the perps) away from a focus on international terrorism over to more comfortable domestic issue?  Oklahoma City was mentioned, but only insofar as Gore contributing a piece to Clinton's 1996 State of the Union address, not about how sleazebag Dick Morris might have influenced Clinton to blame it on Rush Limbaugh. Nothing about the disputed notion of Clinton being offered UBL by the Sudan in 1996.

Speaking of Sudan, how about some emails about whether the bombing of the pharmaceutical plant in Khartoum in 1998, sold to the public by implicating Saddam's scientists as in cahoots with bin Laden to produce VX nerve gas, would play in the media to possibly distract from Lewinskygate.   

Or will all the good stuff remain classified to protect national security?  Maybe somebody could pay Sandy Berger to make another trip to the Archives with some baggy socks. 

Iraq Update

Things are not going well there...

When demonstrators took to the streets in the aftermath of the arrest of the Iraqi finance minister's bodyguards in December 2012, they were carrying Ba'athist flags. Some were even waving al-Qaeda flags. And then in January 2013 Saddam Hussein's former deputy and surviving ranking member of the Ba'ath, Izzat Ibrahim al Douri, made an appearance on television, supporting the demonstrators.

Meanwhile, across the border in Syria, the al-Qaeda franchises Jabhat al Nusra and the Islamic State of Iraq and Sham are growing in strength. Iraqis see the evidence for this on YouTube every day. The resurgence of the Ba'ath party and the resurgence of al-Qaeda, for Iraq’s Shia politicians, is all of their nightmares at once.

Al-Duri is like the Ba'ath Party energizer bunny, he just keeps going, somehow avoiding capture.  Whether he's involved in helping ISIS send fighters to Syria to help topple Bashar Assad (who in their spare time are setting up an Islamic caliphate in the northern part of the country) is unknown. 

Perhaps his longevity can be explained by a relationship to the US of some kind (double agent) or perhaps it's due to something he knows that could be harmful.  Whatever the answer seems destined for future history books.

Meanwhile in America people have forgotten Iraq--for good reason--but this surge in chaos could conceivably become a ticklish political problem for Obama due to his much-trumpeted departure and even more visibly, the optics of America siding with AQ in Iraq over Syria while the president opens rhetorical cans of whoop-ass on AQ franchises everywhere else around the globe (except Benghazi).

President al-Maliki has been in Washington this week pressing the flesh and urging a break in the bottleneck of military hardware his country has ordered that was designed to help fight terrorism.  He met with the president today, something described by both sides as discussing a long-term security relationship, so here's Jay Carney tap dancing around the obvious questions...



Short version, Iraq was a dumb war and we ain't going back, even if AQ attacks America from Iraq, at least as long as Obama is president.  It's Iraq's job to fight our war on terrorism against AQ in Iraq and besides, we are busy using our resources chasing people like Joseph Kony. 

Of course this construct won't last forever.  Should Team Billary get elected in 2016 would they have the same qualms about sending special operators if necessary?  After all, neither have firmly apologized for their tough stance on Iraq over the years.  How are they going to combat the criticism about her vote, especially if the country itself is still in chaos?   Will Hil finally apologize and blame Bush, which still leaves her vulnerable for siding with Bush, or will she or Bill authorize somebody in the know to leak something about Saddam's past actions that makes her vote look much better in retrospect, which would also rescue Bush's long term legacy?   Should be interesting.  

Back from the 90s

The 90s were an interesting time.  Great economy, peace in our time.  Except for AQ and the menace overseas..


Now MSNBC is running a 10 year anniversary Bush lied special.  So if Bush lied wasn't Bill Clinton lying back then?   Does Bush lying prove that Bubba was really wagging the dog after all to avert attention away from Monicagate?   He had most of the same intel, after all.  When will MSNBC ask Bill Clinton these important questions?  

Meanwhile the same impeached president once felt strong enough about gay marriage to sign the Defense of Marriage Act.  Now he has evolved.  The same guy said 'the era of big government is over'.  The era of big government is back--what does he think about it?    

And Hillary. Once opposed to gay matrimony, now all warm and fuzzy smiley pants suity over it.  Once an Iraq hawk and now... well, wait, she's never really come down off that position, despite it costing her the election, which is weird.   Either she truly believed or she's covering her husband's legacy.  Maybe she'll have to climb off that mountain before 2016.    

Speaking of Obama, he was smart on Iraq.  He didn't call Bush a liar, he just said it was a 'dumb war'.  Triangulation, a Clinton trait!  He knew there were too many of his fellow compatriots who called Saddam a menace or voted for the war that calling Bush a liar might leave them in the same box, which would be counter-productive.  It worked. 

In other words, any way the wind blows. But too few in the country care enough to remember. 

Eyes Wide Shut

In the same week the American public has been told:

...that the CIA's waterboarding produced no useful intelligence--except when it did...

...that a man invited to the Pentagon in an Islamic outreach program after 9/11 was actually purchasing airline tickets for the hijackers before 9/11 according to the FBI, yet he wasn't, according to the FBI.  

Yes, the war on terror remains as muddled as ever. 

The Zero Dark 30 back and forth on waterboarding is interesting, though.  Boals and Bigelow were on "Today" today talking about their award-winning film and refused to take a side on controversy despite prodding by Matt Lauer.  Waterboarding was simply part of an overall mosaic, something they compressed into a 2 1/2 hour version of the last 10 years.  It's up to the viewer to decide the morals. 

Of course if the movie starts at 9/11 they've already taken a side.  Telling the UBL story from there is like telling the Saddam Hussein story beginning at the Gulf War.  Bin Laden got his start in the 80s and hit stride in the late 90s, besides, who can forget Bill Clinton saying he did more than anyone to catch Bin Laden?   Who?  Well, apparently the movie makers.  No need to drag Hillary into this.  

Anyway, KSM's trial will eventually cause some of these questions to pop up again.  Obama, a constitutional expert strongly opposed to signing statements, just issued another signing statement on his recent stealthy re-authorization of the NDAA bill, mainly because the bill prevents him from transferring people like KSM to penal facilities here in the states for Article III court trials.  That darned Bush, he's responsible for everything!  Perhaps the FOIA tiff about Awlaqi and Hillary's presumed testimony on Benghazi will open some eyes that have recently been shut. Or not.

By the way, for a good read on the GWoT from an FBI perspective check out "The Threat Matrix" by Garrett Graff.  

Those Evil Clinton Tax Rates

The admin handed reporters a Cyber-Monday press release today:

"As we approach the holiday season, which accounts for close to one-fifth of industry sales, retailers can’t afford the threat of tax increases on middle-class families," the White House said in an email Monday.

Their report claimed that allowing the Obama tax rates to expire would reduce consumer spending 200 million billion dollars.   In other words, the GOP needs to get onboard the coming DNC tax increase before they completely ruin Christmas.  It's for the children.  

But wait, this is interesting. First off, why is Obama bashing Hillary Clinton's husband? Wasn't the budget balanced in the 90s after Newt got control of the purse strings and reined in spending after Billy Jeff's massive 1993 tax hike?   Those are the same rates the administration is fear-mongering about, calling them onerous. Wait again--apparently only the low-end part of those rates were onerous because those who'll have their taxes raised under Obama, back to the Clinton rates, that Bush cut, in this new Obama tax cut that keeps most rates the same except the top end, would apparently not effect consumer spending whatsoever.  Sounds like a Christmas miracle! [ed- edited because none of the above made any damn sense--it still doesn't--just like the current tax rhetoric]

The question is whether any of the various Mr. Potters in the GOP will be bothered to agree with the administration that, yeah, tax cuts do tend to spur spending while tax increases retard growth--see, we told you so.  Or will they cower in a corner somewhere mumbling?   Time will tell.

Path to Paradise

With the recent Muslim street brouhaha over a film clip it might be useful to look back to the salad days of Clinton and the 90s, when jihad was boiling up in America and the government was chasing down terrorists with FBI agents and CIA rendition squads.

In 1997 HBO made a short film about the first WTC attack.  Since they didn't have any visions of Democrat-future to guide them they took a fairly honest look at the situation, with the exception of airbrushing out Iraqi participant Abdul Yasin (it would be interesting to know why).  The film was rather prescient in its predictions--especially the last scene--but apparently didn't ruffle many Islamic feathers at the time.  The whole thing is on You Tube. 

Watching the film gives one a sense of the importance of the man who was bin Laden before the real bin Laden came along--Omar Abdel-Rahman, the "Blind Sheikh", currently serving life in prison in the US.  It also gives one the sense he may be a lot more important than Americans were led to believe then--and now.

So it's comforting to know the current administration has adamantly denied they are in negotiation to release him back to the new Brotherhood leadership in Egypt.  Then again it's not very comforting to consider that any exchange would likely consist of Egypt getting their jihadist leader back and America getting.....a promise that he won't bless anymore terrorist acts against us?  What else could they offer?

The Path Back to 9/11

Isn't it strange.  In a rare moment of candor, or perhaps shoddy editing, 60 Minutes allowed their Sunday guest--a former CIA terror warrior with a long record of battling AQ--to utter the following on air:

Lara Logan: And what did you see there?

Hank Crumpton: We saw a security detail, a convoy and we saw bin Laden exit the vehicle.

Lara Logan: Clearly?

Hank Crumpton: Clearly. And we had-- the optics were spot on. It was beaming back to us, CIA headquarters. We immediately alerted the White House. And the Clinton administration's response was, "Well, it will take several hours for the TLAMs, the cruise missiles launched from submarines, to reach that objective. So you need to tell us where bin Laden will be five or six hours from now." The frustration was enormous.

Lara Logan: So at that moment you wanted to kill him?

Hank Crumpton: Yes.

Lara Logan: But you couldn't get permission?

Hank Crumpton: Correct. He couldn't get permission to do anything, including allowing the CIA's Afghan agents on the ground to attack bin Laden's compound. That missed opportunity in the late summer of 1999, led Crumpton and his CIA team to figure out how to arm the Predator drone with hellfire missiles.

Anyone following along would not be surprised. His story backs up people like Michael Scheuer, former head of the Alec Station UBL unit and it follows pretty close to the scene in "Path to 9/11" that the Clintonistas didn't want shown.  Perhaps CBS felt safe to air it with UBL now killed by another Democrat president and Bush safely retired in Dallas (and maintaining media silence). Romney is running on the economy.

Meanwhile some in the intelligence business are still piping hot mad over the presumed US leak about super double agent underwear bomber 2.0.  Everyone presumably except the US elite media.